Online school is not the problem

This is remote learning. (Image by Pexels)

Millions of students all over the world have been engaged in a disastrous experiment in distance learning.

Some districts and classrooms have insisted on a synchronous model where students spend long, painful hours on Zoom; at the other extreme, packets of worksheets are distributed and students are basically on their own.

Why are the results so poor? For one thing, teams of educators in schools and districts everywhere are being asked by administrators who have no experience with distance learning to do a job for which they have no training — and with no time for planning. It’s hard to imagine how such an undertaking could possibly be successful by any definition. It was doomed from the start.

Large organizations, even well-funded ones, cannot quickly pivot under the best of circumstances. Kodak and Blockbuster couldn’t successfully make the switch to digital — why would we expect schools to do it (and literally overnight)?

And these are not the best of circumstances. Parents are trying to do their jobs and educate their kids at the same time (which, they are discovering, is nearly impossible). Meanwhile, a global pandemic rages on, stimulating fear and anxiety, causing illness and loss of life, and preventing us all from engaging in normal social lives, travel, and recreation. Not to mention ongoing widespread economic uncertainty ranging from “Dad might have to take a pay cut" to “We don’t know where our next meal is coming from.”

So of course the experiment has been a disaster. Any one of these factors could create a terrible outcome for students. Put it all together and how could it not be utter misery?

Here’s an additional layer: We are approaching the final weeks of the semester, in which older students would ordinarily be ramping up their preparation for end-of-year exams and placement tests and completing capstone projects; at the same time, younger students at many schools might be found participating in collaborative art, field trips, and outdoor experiences. Students of all ages would be planning for milestone events like class trips, special parties, assemblies, awards ceremonies, and graduation. Schools know that students start getting a bit antsy when the weather starts getting nicer and the promise of summer vacation looms, and we’ve built incentives and rituals into the end of the year in order to account for that. Right now, none of that is possible, and the antsiness is divorced from its usual context. It’s just seen as more evidence of how crummy online school is when it is simply a normal part of the season.

I’m here to say that online school doesn’t have to be crummy. It can be great. It can be the perfect choice for a family who wants to travel the world; for a medically fragile child; for an athlete or performing artist who wants to complete her schoolwork in a fraction of the time; for a student with learning differences, including giftedness, who wants more freedom in pacing and programming; for a student struggling with bullying, anxiety, or sensory processing challenges; for a student who wants to quickly and efficiently catch up to grade level; for a student who wants an individualized experience.

Remote learning doesn’t have to be for everyone to be worthwhile. However, it could be an ideal solution for times like these if teachers have a chance to execute it properly. Instructional design takes time and testing to perfect, and the traditional classroom has had a long head start. That doesn’t mean that learning without classrooms is fundamentally inferior. It’s just different, with different strengths and weaknesses.

Under non-quarantine conditions, online school doesn’t have to be isolating. It doesn’t even mean that you spend all your time online. Students can participate in extracurricular activities, see friends, live their lives. I spent a lovely day with one of my online students last fall, exploring the monuments and memorials of the National Mall in Washington, D.C., together. There are many ways to connect as an online learning community, and meeting in person is one of them. Even the end-of-the-year rituals can happen with online school.

All over the United States, schools are abandoning requirements for course completion. There are many reasons for this. They don’t necessarily have the infrastructure needed to ensure that students have access to the proper learning tools (i.e., laptops and WiFi). Another issue is that some courses (like science labs and concert band) were not conceived as online ones and can’t be readily adapted. In addition, there may be no protocol for administering exams and ensuring academic honesty.

These aren’t problems of online learning, per se. They’re the problems you’d expect if you planned to do one thing and suddenly ended up doing another. The upheaval we’ve experienced — the suffering we’re still in the midst of — makes it difficult for learning communities to concentrate on learning. They’re just trying to get through the day. That’s not the fault of a teacher, school district, some online learning platform with a silly name, or online school in general. It’s COVID-19.

I’d love to tell you that my students are thriving because we already knew what we were doing with online school. Some of them are doing fine, but no — this is really hard for everyone. We all have to find a way to get through these last few weeks of the academic year as best we can. Then we’ll rest, regroup, and figure out what’s next, hopefully with a sense of possibility and an open mind about all of our options.